I took a public speaking class.
Or, why flexing an already-strong muscle while reshaping my life was the best thing I could’ve done for myself
Gosh does it feel nice to do something you’re good at.
I suppose this is where I talk about my particular brand of academic imposter syndrome. I’d assess myself as generally competent at the parts of academic jobs lauded on tenure and promotion applications. While I think I am an excellent writer, I’d say I’m a competent academic writer. While I love teaching and have worked hard to get better at it, I’d say I’m competent most days. I do these parts of my job well but feel I still have much to improve upon. By contrast, I think my skills at coordinating schedules, organizing a workflow, and communicating with team members are well above average—but these are not skills academia outwardly values, even as it relies on someone having them and executing them thanklessly in order for the wheels of the university to keep turning. I digress.
It really is mind-boggling the amount of skills academics are expected to have and for how few of these we ever receive any training. I’d guess that was the logic behind the public speaking class offered as part of the British International Studies Association’s June 2024 Mid-Career Workshop. From classroom lectures to conference presentations, normal academic work involves a lot of prepared talks given in front of other people. Yet most academics receive little if any formal training in the many difficult skills involved in this part of the job—to say nothing of the anxiety that speaking in front others can induce.
Impromptu public speaking, for me, is nothing like that. I don’t want to say it’s effortless because I recall all too well the weeks, months, years of effort I put into it as a competitive speech and debate kid in high school. Perhaps a better characterization is that it is a challenge I am consistently confident I can conquer. Being asked to prepare a short speech with only a few minutes’ prep time is something I did three to 10 times every weekend as a teenager by choice. Doing it again was like slipping on an old pair of running shoes. Even if you haven’t run in years, the time you once devoted to the task means the shoes are perfectly formed to your feet and you know how they’re going to feel as you fall into a familiar gait.
This is my explanation for why I stood alone at the 8–9 mark on a 10–point scale that afternoon in June, with 1 representing “an impromptu speech is the worst activity I could think of “ to 10 being “I am totally fine doing this; no reservations.” To be clear: none of this was part of the plan. As part of the day-long workshop, my amazing friend Carl Gibson and I were invited to do a morning session on reflective assessment (which Carl has really pioneered in our department, and on which I have piggybacked). It did not register to me when I agreed to do this that sticking around for the whole day was part of the deal. Likewise, I’ve been in the UK long enough to have internalized some amount of English self-deprecation and under-estimation, such that I spent probably a full minute quietly panicking about choosing a 9 out of 10 in front of other people.
I’ll be honest. I didn’t want to be in the class. I had other work I needed to get done, I hadn’t eaten enough for lunch, and I was convinced my public speaking skills were more than up to par. Still, I try very hard not to be an asshole without reason, and I decided I would approach the class as enthusiastically as I could.
A spoiler you may have already guessed given that I’m writing this post: I actually enjoyed the class. And I did, in fact, get a lot out of it—but perhaps not what the workshop organizer or class facilitator intended. In short, I got to spend four hours exercising a muscle that was already strong, refining a skillset that was already sharp, and practicing an activity that makes me feel good about myself. At a transitional time in my life and career, it was about the most beneficial thing I could’ve done.
When I decided to leave academia and pursue something different, I found myself having to figure out how to tell my story to people who had no idea who I was and didn’t speak the academic language I’d spent a decade perfecting. And so I needed to learn to tell that story differently. What can I do? Where do I thrive? To continue with the running shoes metaphor, trying out narratives to see what feels right is a bit like trying on new kicks. There are so many options and many could work, provided you have infinite money and time to sort through everything on the market, and since most people don’t, you can never quite shake the feeling that there might be a better option out there. What feels good in the store may feel worse by the time you get the shoes home. And ultimately, you’re not going to know if a pair holds up until you’re a sweaty mess a few miles in.
Much as I like talking about myself (I mean, I have a personal newsletter), doing so in the traditional corporate “pls hire me” mold makes my skin crawl. The first time I went on the academic job market, it took about 40 applications for the act of cover-letter tweaking to become enough of a reflex that I could divorce my mind from the task entirely and experience zero emotional response. Now, as I apply for non-academic jobs, I have to do something strange and unorthodox with about every third application to keep from retreating into a hovel.
In the public speaking class, however, I was able to do something revelatory: talk about myself and my life, while exercising a skillset in which I’m confident, without having to name that skillset or explain any successes I’d had using it. I got to just exist as a more-than-competent human being. In writerspeak, I got to show, not tell, and I could do so without having to prove myself to anyone. At the end of the day, the person I was “showing” was me.
At one point, we were each given a question and had to speak on it on the fly for three minutes—no preparation. I started to feel stressed as my turn approached: the topic could be anything, and if I find myself in a conversation where I have a nuanced opinion, articulating that verbally is initially a messy endeavor. In most discussions, I’d like to have at least three gos, and if I do get multiple opportunities to speak on the same topic, my answer can end up sounding rehearsed, even though it’s just me having workshopped the best words to convey my point. But I was extraordinarily lucky. The instructor couldn’t have known that “which is more important: family or friends” is well-trodden territory for pretty much every queer person. Not only did I get to practice my skills at impromptu speaking, I got to talk about disrupting norms and friends becoming chosen family, a process I know intimately. That, too, felt like a gift.
I don’t want to say I need validation, but truths we’re working through are still truths, and as a Cancer sun and Cancer ascendant writing on the eve of the Cancerian new moon, it would be inappropriate not to name my deep need to hear that I’m doing a good job. And so the class facilitator gave me a final gift, offered up after my speech on chosen family. “You have such a natural delivery,” she said. I’m still picking apart why this resonated so deeply—maybe because I don’t recall having heard it before. Fundamentally, though, this comment speaks to how I think the mastery of any craft should feel: like it flows. Like a clear mountain stream in the summer, after the height of the snowmelt has passed. Like something unimpeded yet unrushed. And, yes, like something natural.
So, if there’s a lesson in all of meandering, it’s to do things you’re good at! Do them in educational settings where you’re not trying to win anything or be better than anyone else. Do them outside of a labor relation where you don’t have to perform well to earn money. This last one can be difficult, and I feel the financial pressure ever more heavily as the end of my academic contract approaches, but if you have the time and space to allow yourself to practice with others: practice. Let yourself remember the work you’ve put in and relish the results.
Revamping my life means I’m exploring lots of new things, most with more intention than sticking around for an afternoon public speaking class. I’m thinking I might make “I tried a thing” a regular installment of this newsletter, alongside other writings and musings that are more academia-related or collective action-focused (as per usual). If you might be interested in what I’ve learned from the runes I painted or my adventures with embroidery and breaking the hoop 30 seconds after starting, would you let me know in the comments? You can also hit “subscribe” and I’ll take that as encouragement.